The morning news. [volume] (Savannah, Ga.) 1887-1900, 1887-05-29
A STUDY OF THE THUMB.
ITS PLACE AND POWER IN HU-
MAN AFFAIRS.

TO Say ABOUT U--SuSIOnS, uses ana
Decentralization to Escape Mill
tary Service.
From an English Paper
On the length, strength, free lateral mo-
ton and perfect mobility of the thumb de-
ponds the power of the human hand. The
thumb is called pollex because of its strength
and that strength is necessary to the power
of the hand, being equal to that of all the
fingers Without the heshy ball of the
thumb the power of the fingers would avail
nothing, and accordingly the large ball
formed by the muscles of the thumb is the
distinguishing character of the human hand.
The loss of the thumb almost amounts to
the loss of the hand, and were it to happen
in both hands it would reduce man to a
miserable dependence, or, as Adonibezell
said Of the three score and ten kings, the
thumbs of whose hands land of whose feet,
tool he had cut off, ''They gather their meat
under my table" Such is the language used
by Sir Charles Bell, f. R. s., etc, the late
eminent physician, in his celebrated Bridge
water treaties on "The Hand about this
most important part of the grand prehen-
sile mechanism which SO distinguishes man
from most of the lower animals The
origin of the word thumb is probably
from the Sanacrit root tdUmi, to grow
large, and connected with the Latin tuineo
to swell. In Anglo Saxon the word was
thuma, in Danish temmel finger, and it has
also been termed antidigit, from its posi-
ton and uses The Greeks called it an
ticheir, or another hand. The Romans
knew it as poLLec, noun derived from the
word police, to be strong, to excel, thus in
dicating both its general excellence and its
special superiority over the other component
parts of the hand.
The thumb is no mean member of the hui
man body, for in the brilliant days of Rome,
when the multitude had to be pleased by dis
plays provided for them in the amphithea-
tres, it had life and death at its command.
single movement, a slight infection of its
joints one way or the other, settled the fate
of many a one. OF course we allude to the
practice pursued at the gladiatorial shows
of deciding whether the poor wretches who
hacked and slashed each other or who
fought with wild beasts for the delectation
of the mob or amusement of their masters
should be allowed to survive the combat or
not. This was indicated by the spectators
turning the thumb up or down. Among
the Romans to close down the thumbs
(premere) was a sign of appreciation, but to
extend it (Uertere or pollen InfestltS) was a
sign of disapproval. So if a gladiator, after
fighting bravely with man or beast, was at
last worsted and put at his oppnent's mercy,
the onlookers would sometimes interpose
and save his life by elevating their hands
and turning their thumbs downward The
fiat thus expressed was all powerful to save.
But If they were displeaSed with the con-
duct of any particular combatant they al
most uniformly condemned him to death by
elevating their thumbs and bending them
outward, and the poor wretch thus despised
was dispatched accordingly by the weapon
of his adversary; or if that adversary hap
pened to be beast he was left to perish be-
meath its fangs unpitied and unaided In
allursion to the practice of the popu-
lace at these degrading spectacles, Juvenal
says:
The vulgar with uplifted thumbs,
Kill each one that before them comes,
And this was indeed the case when the state
of public affairs put them into an evil tenn
per. Happily, such methods of entertain
ing troublesome proletrariat have passed
away; but we have an acknowledgment of
the entire submission of one person to the
stronger will Of another in the term under
ones thumb" an expression that has become
quite classic, for does not the Edinburgh
Reute1G says:
"Gunhilda soon had him completely I'M
der her thumb; and instead of his making
her, she unmade him, and was in every re-
spect the evil genius of him and his chill
dren.n And Richardson, the novelist also
has, ''She is obliged to be silentl i have her
under my thumb"
The thumb has in past days played an
important part, too, in bargain making.
Tacitus, for example, tells us that certain
barbarian kings, when they desired TO make
specially firm and lasting contract, were
in the habit of joining their right hands and
twisting each others thumbs, or tying them
together with a cord, and when the pressure
forced the blood to appear at the tips, they
then prlcked them with some sharp instrll-
ment and mutually sucked them. This act
was doubtless meant as an emblem to ex-
press their desire to secure a lasting peace
by extracting the hot and fiery blood from
that member, so important in handling
arms In later times we find the Celtic and
Gothic races piacticing something like the
same mode. They swore upon the thumb.
Thus Allen Ramsay sings;
Though kith and kin and a should revile thee,
There's my thumb, I'll ne'er beguile thee.
If two persons respectively licked or wet
ted their thumbs and joined the one to the
other the bargain or agreement was held to
be firm and binding. In Scottish records
DEGREES are to be found sustaining sales
upon summonses of thumb licking, the fact
of that ceremony having been gone through
at the time of bargaining being considered
to constitute valid agreement Such was
a custom really prevalent among farmers
and tradesmen in that country some fifty
years ago in markets and places of sale. The
wet thumb was a token of rectitude of in
tention seldom falsified, and the man who
broke his word after confirming it by that
sign was looked upon as one whom no oaths
could bind. This may be the origin of a
custom among school children, known to
most parent and teachers, of wetting the
finger and saying, us that wetp then WHIP
ing it and asking, SIS that dryF etc, when
they are agreeing upon or bargaining for
anything among their companions. The
act also meant that two persons had com
munity of opinion on any subject Thus
the saying may be still heard i'm some
parts of Scotland, eve may lick thooms
upo' that. e., we are quite agreed upon
that point.
AT one time, wearing ring ON the thumb
was sign of authority The word ''thumb
ring" occurs in Shakespeare, in / Henry
w., III. and 4, where old Falstaff says, "A
plague of signing and grief 1t blows man
up like bladder. When / was about thy
years, Hal, / was not an eagles talon in-the
waist; could have crept into an Alderman's
thumb ring" Such an article was actually
worn by those civic functionaIies IN past days
and perhaps as a sign Of respect entertained
for che thumb itself The "ring Of ringso-
the wedding ring-is now worn on the
fourth digit of the hand, perhaps from a